


Toxic Shippers: My Take

by SunshineDawn



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Original work - Freeform, Rants, Shipping, toxic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-15 06:06:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29554659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunshineDawn/pseuds/SunshineDawn
Summary: And response to "The Toxicity of Shippers" by Kasuna_KotonohaHi! So in short, here is work that is a RANT AND IS NOT A FIC.I know this is out of the norm, but I don't have tumblr or really any social media. I just want to get this out there because I have seen a lot of toxic shippers and I also want people to understand how others might see certain ships such as Percy/Annabeth (Percabeth) from Percy Jackson and the Olympians.
Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson
Comments: 8
Kudos: 11





	Toxic Shippers: My Take

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The toxicity of Shippers](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27358981) by [Kasuna_Kotonoha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kasuna_Kotonoha/pseuds/Kasuna_Kotonoha). 



> I want to show NO HATE to Kasuna_Kotonoha, I actually quite agreed with their take. Also, if you don't agree with anything I am saying, please share your opinions NICELY in the comments. Please remember you may be entitled to your own opinion, but we are entitled not to listen if we wish.  
> I reference two links in this post, and while I set them to link in during the work, I don't know if they will actually work. So heres the two links:  
> Link One: https://www.quora.com/When-Annabeth-punches-judo-flips-and-hits-Percy-isn-t-that-abusive-He-says-it-hurts-I-m-a-Percabeth-shipper-so-I-am-just-curious-If-the-rolls-were-reversed-would-people-hate-Percy  
> Link Two: https://www.reddit.com/r/camphalfblood/comments/imsjbl/what_do_poc_think_of_ricks_representation/
> 
> Also, I will be posting the first chapter of a fic where the characters from Percy Jackson read through the first book sometime soon. It's kinda gonna be a testing chapter to see how well it goes.
> 
> Thanks to my bestie for beta reading like always. Love you, sweetcheeks, and thanks for everything <3.
> 
> Please be nice, and remember, "A kind act can sometimes be as powerful as a sword.” -Rick Riordan.
> 
> -Sunshine Dawn <3

Hi! I'm here to ask some questions and explain how I'm thinking, I don't want to offend or hurt anyone <3

(I’d also like to state I have only read the ten books in the PJO and HoO series as it is all I have and my library is closed due to COVID.)

So I am very confused, and even slightly annoyed.

I read the PJO series and the HoO series all in a row a few months ago, and I’m a young adult (don’t really wanna put my age on the internet) so there's that. (I am also rereading them all rn, and about to start the fifth book in PJO.)

Here's how I'm thinking:

** Toxic Shippers **

I ship pretty much all the ships in the PJO universe, except maybe the really wack ones. (I’m talking Annabeth/Tyson, or Percy/Apollo or any god. That one just feels a little wack to me, since while the gods can appear younger, they are still thousands of years old and Percy is like not and I don't ship the Percy/Grover ship either). I honestly will read pretty much anything. I am even currently reading a series of fics by lorixjake and their reading Percy Jackson series. That's Apollo/Percy.

** Still About Toxic Shippers, But I Also Go Into Percabeth, and Why I Don’t Think It Is Abusive **

Yet, I don't understand why people say Annabeth/Percy is abusive. Like, yes, flip the sexes and you could say it's abusive, but I feel like calling a fictional relationship abusive (unless it's like Bella/Edward or sm) is kinda extra. But this is where I get confused. I was taught in psychology that an abusive relationship is where one partner holds all power of the other, or manipulates the other into thinking they have the power when they really don't (manipulation could be words, hitting, gaslighting it's kinda based on situation to situation). Yet, it feels like Riordan didn't write one character to be more powerful over the other. I mean, we see Percy willingly jump into Tartarus for Annabeth, and Annabeth was willing to fight on Percy's side of a theoretical war even if she had to fight all her siblings and her mother. 

Even so, I'd like to link in [ this quora page ](https://www.quora.com/When-Annabeth-punches-judo-flips-and-hits-Percy-isn-t-that-abusive-He-says-it-hurts-I-m-a-Percabeth-shipper-so-I-am-just-curious-If-the-rolls-were-reversed-would-people-hate-Percy) (link one), because this person said something that made me entirely reevaluate Percabeth, and even my psych classes. 

**Annabeth’s Background and Possible Trauma**

_(referencing link one)_

Here, the person I am talking about is Mike Knopp, where they talk about comparing a kid they grew up with named John to Annabeth. (It's a really good read, and they are really good at wording things well) They mention how Annabeth was abandoned at a young age, even maybe at birth. Her mom sent her down to her father right after birth with no second thought, where she went from being neglected by her father then to being abused by her step mom and father who favored her two half brothers. Then she runs, makes two friends who fill this sort of parental and older sibling roles at the exact same time. But once again, shortly after she probably became attached, what happens? It all falls apart again. Thalia is killed, and Luke who is decently older, probably goes on to make his own friends. So, she learns again. “It only takes something to happen twice where the human mind will recognize a pattern” (a quote from one of my teachers) She learns that anyone she gets close to will leave somehow, no matter how close to her they are. I can't imagine Luke ignored her completely at camp considering all they had been through but we have to remember that he referred to her as his little sister. If you have younger siblings then you probably understand that having a sibling several years younger than you is hard to connect with. My brother is seven years younger than me, and while we are extremely close, he just isn't old enough to full grasp the concept of older emotions and he doesn't read social situations very well since he is so young. I can imagine Luke feeling the same at least once or twice as they grew older, while at camp.

Now let's compare Annabeth's behavior as an older child and then teen to how she might’ve acted as a small child.

As a product of being abandoned and neglected her entire life, she would’ve taught herself to do what is called self soothing. Yet, most who go through childhood trauma where they are neglected or abused (And here I am speaking from experience as well as watching and learning) I've noticed they tend to crave attention in the more caring, loving contact way. That is why I think people who are in an abusive relationship will sometimes jump from abusive relationship to abusive relationship. They may not know any different So in Annabeth’s case, she might’ve been clingy or needy to Luke as a way to deal with her trauma and as a small child seeking comfort. Now whether or not he gave that to her we will never know, but we can see her display a similar set of actions in both the _Sea of Monsters_ and the The _Battle of The Labyrinth_. She doesn’t like how Tyson is around in the SoM, maybe a combined fear of cyclops and a fear of being left again, and then again later in books when Percy and her meet Rachel. This could explain why she acts out in anger at Percy when she finds him talking to Rachel, while this doesn’t excuse her actions, it may give some explanation. I quite like how Mike Knobbs phrases it, “But then there was Percy. He just took her abuse, both verbal and sometimes physical, and refused to stay away. He gave Annabeth the kind of unconditional friendship and love that she needed.” Annabeth needed a rock to teach her that not everyone left.

**Why I Believe Annabeth Was Not A Bad Person, But Rather A Misunderstood Person**

I know from experience how that feels. My best friend is my rock, and I would do anything for her. I would take a bullet for her. 

When I read Percy Jackson I can’t help but be so relieved that there are characters out there who went through childhood trauma and reacted like I did. They reacted with anger or aggression and people tried to avoid them for it. Annabeth was and is like me, and I felt so relieved for that.

I ask you this, do you know what it is like to find yourself in a book character? A character who thinks like you, acts like you, or maybe looks like you. Maybe has similar life experiences to you? And then you see that character maybe fall in love, or find a best friend. Or maybe you see that character do something you always thought was impossible for you to do because of those differences, issues or insecurities. 

It’s almost like a small piece of hope is relit inside you, and a feeling of relief would wash over you. That it’s not a lost cause for you.

Annabeth gives that to kids like me. We are the kids that wish we could’ve taken our trauma and reacted like Percy, where it gives us the need to please others and give everyone this impression that we are these cute absolute angels (because I feel like the media makes trauma look like everyone who does go through it is this soft, innocent angel who just wants love, and just stays quiet in the corner waiting for someone to save us, when some, like me, act out in possibly negative or aggressive ways) when in reality, we reacted like Annabeth. Everyone thinks we are toxic, abusive, and (pardon my language) assholes.

I found my Percy in my best friend. 

**Toxic Shippers (Again)**

I don’t condone toxic shippers. Everyone should be allowed to ship who they want.

  
But I want you to take a moment before you call Annabeth toxic or abusive, or call Percabeth a toxic ship, and think on why they made their actions, those actions.

Toxic shipping is a negative practice many do in so many different fandoms. Everyone reads the novels with different interpretations, even the authors. So while the authors shipped two characters one way and you don’t, doesn’t give you the right to hate on them and on others. 

Hating on people who ship Percabeth is cruel, as that ship could mean more than just romantic or “cute” fan fiction and fan art. Hating on people who ship anything is cruel, because who are you to know why they ship that? Maybe it is just the fanfiction or the fact that they think it is cute, or maybe it is because they have other emotions attached to it.

Toxic shipping is wrong. And even if someone ships a straight up abusive relationship, doesn’t mean you can attack them. Try pointing out nicely what could be potentially wrong with their ship, and if they don’t agree, back away and move on. Sometimes some fights just aren’t worth fighting, and fighting over a ship isn’t the most important thing to fight over right now.

Overall, be nice and respect others’ ships.

**My Take On The Racism/Other Issues In The Novels**

Riordan may have some problematic issues, and he needs to fix those. You can’t excuse racism or sexism (though I didn’t notice anything like that in the books, I have heard people say he did some bad things. I probably was too in love with the series, so if you want to, feel free to give me examples please)

No author is perfect. I doubt Riordan wrote the series’ with the intent to hurt anyone. He was just trying to portray the characters in his imagination while trying to give everyone a character they could look up to. It doesn’t matter how big the whole universe gets, or how many fans fall in love with it each day, someone is always going to love it, and someone is going to hate. Maybe now there are ways for a white man like Riordan to write better POC characters, or mentally hurt characters, but we have to put ourselves in his shoes, and that he wrote and published the first book in 2005. All the main characters were white, and he set out to make the main relationship a cisgendered hetero white “main male protagonist gets main female protagonist” relationship. People hate on the fact that the two main characters got put together, but if Riordan put Percy with Rachel to avoid that particular trope, people would hate on him for being different. Kinda like how people hate on the “i’m not like other girls” thing. There was no way he’d make everyone happy.

As the series grew, the fan base grew. The fan base is diverse, and Riordan tried to write more POC characters the second time around to try and include all those people who read it that would share the same skin color as someone like the POC characters. I feel like him writing in Nico to be a gay character was a easy, natural path rather than a forced one. It feels like he did that with a lot of the POC characters, just from an outside pov (as none of us are Rick Riordan, we all have outside povs, because only he knows how he originally imagined the characters as he wrote them). 

**My Idea On How We Can Fix Future Issues With People Writing People of Other Groups**

_(i mean like races, religions, cultures, lgbtq etc)_

I’d like to link a [ reddit thread ](https://www.reddit.com/r/camphalfblood/comments/imsjbl/what_do_poc_think_of_ricks_representation/) (link two) where POC and LGBTQ+ people say what they think about Riordan’s characters. 

I am a bisexual mixed female who can pass for white. So I loved Nico’s character, and my mother (who’s POC) loved the representation of the POC characters in the series. 

Racism and white people writing POC characters is something the author-world needs to work on. Maybe not stop white people from writing POC characters, but have things in place before publishing to make sure it’s all good. Have POC people beta read and give feedback, have the author do research and learn all about that culture or race they are writing about. Have the author avoid stereotypes of all kinds (all stereotypes are negative no matter who or what they are about). I think by welcoming in correction can help get rid of racism/sexism or other hatred to minorities faster than instantly destroying anyone who doesn’t know. We need to give everyone a chance to learn because nobody who isn’t of that minority instantly knows what struggles they go through. Someone has to teach someone, no matter the age. (that doesn’t mean we can’t throw a burrito at a truly racism, sexism, homophobic etc person though)

  
  
  


Percy Jackson a series that truly made the childhoods of countless kids all over the world. It will continue to do so. I think we should calmly make our opinions known to others in the proper places, but never hate. Everyone is allowed their own opinion, but not entitled to share it in every place. People are not required to listen to your opinion either.

Be nice, and remember, _“A kind act can sometimes be as powerful as a sword.” -Rick Riordan._

-Sunshine Dawn <3


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